For the Passion posts that I chose I believe that these are the most important for a very specific reason. This reason has to do with the overlying themes brought up in the posts. One post deals with the idolization of celebrities and the other is the issue of body image in not only celebrities but normal people as well. In both posts I tried to go deeper than just summarizing the big story in celebrity news for that week. The Bald for Bieber post not only placed the blame of extreme idolization of celebrities on parents but our society as a whole. My Lady Gaga post took the issue of body image and focued it on someone who you may not have thought struggled with issues such as Bulimia and Anorexia. I wanted to provide a forum for discussion on serious topics that re not always at the forefronts of our minds. From the content of the posts and also the comments left by others I think that I can safely say that the posts did what they were supposed to do.

For my RCL posts I think I took public events (Do the Right Thing event, Gangnam style phenomenon) and posed the necessary questions needed to analyze these things in order to provide relevant and stimulating discussion. For the Do the Right Thing post I expressed my views on the movie and subsequent Q&A session and I raised topics that may have been sensitive in nature but necessary. I did the same thing for my Gangnam Style post. What I talked about was met with dissention from a few people and provided an opportunity for people not only in our class but ariund the country to look at their actions concerning the video and maybe come to a realization that it was not all innocent.

The film Do The Right Thing explores various themes of racial tension, civic duty, and conflicting ideologies among racial groups. The film presents a very honest look at the lives, actions and inner thoughts of the various characters and their struggles and opinions. Each character seems to act according to what, in their minds, is the “right thing”. For example, Buggin’ Out believed that his civic duty was to convince Sal to put black people on the wall of fame, Radio Raheem’s was to spread his music’s message no matter the occasion. When the fights broke out in front of Sal’s the cops fought to contain the crowd in anyway possible, including violence, later resulting in the death of Radio Raheem. There is nothing wrong with being a part of one’s community or having a civic life. However, the characters in the film all have ideologies that conflict to the point of chaos, violence, and tragedy.

Throughout the film there are various instances of racism and racial contempt. A prime example of this is Sal’s son Pino. Pino hates the primarily black neighborhood in which he works and often refers to black people as apes or ”niggers”, a part of the movie I felt did not deserve laughter. His contempt for his fellow black citizens was not only disturbing but unfounded.

The panel discussion that followed not only was controversial but shocking as well. What I saw from some of the speakers upset me greatly as a black person. I felt that pointless stereotypes were being perpetuated and agreed with by a large amount of the people present. I had hoped that the movie and the subsequent discussion would clear away peoples’ preexisting thoughts concerning the subjects presented in the film, but that didn’t seem to be the case.